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Participant
April 21, 2024
Answered

Question: How do I fix my messed up timeline?

  • April 21, 2024
  • 3 replies
  • 1610 views

 

I've just installed Adobe After Effects for future projects I want to work on and began practicing using it, I saw this tutorial on how to do an effect I liked and tried it out. 
While messing with the time settings I made my timeline look weird? It doesn't display seconds anymore, and I really don't know how to navigate this, any help on how to make my timeline display seconds instead of whatever this is? 

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Correct answer Warren Heaton

It looks like your Time Ruler in the Timeline panel is zoomed all the way out for a Composition that has a short duration.


For example, a the Time Ruler in a Composition that is ten frames long (0:00:00:10) will look like this (similar to your screenshot):


And the Time Ruler in a Composition that is ten seconds long (0:00:10:00) will look like this:



Go to your Composition Settings (Composition > Composition Settings) and increase the duration of the Composition.

 

3 replies

Warren Heaton
Community Expert
Warren HeatonCommunity ExpertCorrect answer
Community Expert
April 21, 2024

It looks like your Time Ruler in the Timeline panel is zoomed all the way out for a Composition that has a short duration.


For example, a the Time Ruler in a Composition that is ten frames long (0:00:00:10) will look like this (similar to your screenshot):


And the Time Ruler in a Composition that is ten seconds long (0:00:10:00) will look like this:



Go to your Composition Settings (Composition > Composition Settings) and increase the duration of the Composition.

 

Participant
April 21, 2024

Ahh I see, thank you for the help! :]

Community Expert
April 21, 2024

Also, make sure your composition lasts a few seconds because otherwise you will still only see the f (frames) and not the s (seconds).

Byron.
Community Expert
April 21, 2024

At the bottom of the timeline you have a horizontal zoom slider, clearly you have everything on the right, slide it to the left so that it is not so wide and you will surely see the seconds.

 

Byron.
Participant
April 21, 2024

Ok, thank you! 😅

Community Expert
April 21, 2024

You're welcome!

Byron.